Author: Elizabeth Broman

The Cooper-Hewitt Library owns many types of pattern books for architecture, textiles, wall coverings, and ornament for use by designers. Among our more unusual “how to” pattern books and trade catalogs are two recently digitized hair jewelry pattern books – The jewellers' book of patterns in hair work and Charles T. Menge's price list of...

The Cooper-Hewitt Library has a large collection of over 2,000 World’s fair catalogues and books. Some are children’s souvenirs and stories. A day at the New York World's Fair with Peter and Wendy brings back memories of certain things I remember. As a teenager, my mother had loved the 1939 World’s fair, so that when...

This Catalogue of the Monumental Bronze Co. is one of the many examples of trade literature that the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Library has in its collection; they are among the most valuable research resources for documenting the tastes and trends of culture, and the products being marketed and sold in a given time period. This...

Isn’t it wonderful to sit outside under a shady tree in a comfortable chair? Wicker furniture, cold drinks and a porch swing…heaven. I used to have a wicker armchair in my living room, bought at a junk store and treasured until it began squeaking with the slightest movement and my cats started turning it a pile...

On a long ago walking tour of downtown New York, I was charmed and mystified to see people pulling refrigerator magnets or little alphabet letters out of their pockets and having them cling to the deceptively ordinary front of a building! They stuck! This is the test of a cast iron building. The Library has in its...

Title translation: A representation of Inland and Foreign Wood: As well Trees as [sic] Shrubs Which are Collected by the Lovers of Natural History in Their Cabinets of Natural Curiosities for Use and Pleasure. According to Their Inward Properties and Natural Colors … In a page headlined Advertisement, Sepp says this book is for “Kings,...

This extremely rare trade catalog from 1940, in the collection of the Cooper-Hewitt Museum Library, represents the output of 10 state-owned ceramics factories from all over the Ukraine in small towns and villages after industry was nationalized in 1918. Katalog farforu faiansu i maĭoliky is a primary source document for studying the decorative arts, material culture, and political...